Your Face Tomorrow. Fever And Spear (25 page)

'I think it's terrible, the worst possible thing that could happen. Remember that my country suffered for forty years because of just such a coup. Three years of romantic war perhaps (romantic at least to English eyes), followed by thirty-seven years of destruction and oppression. But leaving theory aside, that is, leaving aside principles, I wouldn't really care in this particular case. Chavez led an attempted coup once, if I remember rightly. He conspired with his troops and rose up against an elected civilian government. True, it may have been a corrupt and thieving government, but then what government isn't nowadays, they handle far too much money and are more like businesses than governments, and businessmen want their profits. So he couldn't really complain if he was ousted. The Venezuelan people are another matter. They might. Except that there seem to have been quite a few complaints already about this leader whom they elected by popular acclaim. Being elected doesn't immunise a leader against becoming a dictator.'

'You seem very well informed.'

'I read the newspapers, I watch television. That's all.'

'Tell me more. Tell me if the Venezuelan gentleman was telling the truth.'

'About what?'

'Generally. For example, as to whether, if it came to it, they would touch the Comandante or not.'

'He said two different things about that.'

Tupra looked slightly irritated, but only slightly. He gave me the impression that he was enjoying himself, that he liked this conversation and my quickness, once I had got over my initial hesitancy and once stimulated by his questioning, Tupra was a great one for asking questions, he never forgot what people had said in reply and so was able to return to that reply when the interrogatee least expected it and had forgotten about it, we forget what we say much more than what we hear, what we write much more than what we read, what we send much more than what we receive, that is why we barely count the insults we hand out to others, unlike those dealt out to us, which is why almost everyone harbours some grudge against someone.

'I know that, Mr Deza. I'm asking you if either of those two things is true. In your opinion. Please.'

That 'please' worried me. Later on, I learned that he always resorted to such formulae, 'if you would be so kind', 'if you wouldn't mind' when he was about to get really annoyed. On that occasion, I merely sensed this and so hastened to respond, without giving much thought to what I said and having given it no previous thought at all.

'In my opinion, one was not true at all. The other was, but the context in which it was given wasn't.'

'Explain that, will you?' He had still not lit the dangling cigarette, which, despite having a filter, would surely be getting soggy, I was familiar with the extravagant brand, Rameses II, Egyptian cigarettes made from slightly spicy-tasting Turkish tobacco, the lavish red packet on the desk looked like a drawing from Tintin, they would be very expensive nowadays, he must have bought them from Davidoff or Marcovitch or in Smith & Sons (if the last two still exist), I didn't recall him smoking them at Wheeler's house, perhaps he only smoked them in private. I didn't apply a match to my more commonplace cigarette either, although mine was still dry, my lips are not moist.

I merely improvised, that's all. I had nothing to lose. Nor to gain either, I had been summoned to act as translator and had performed that role. Remaining there was a courtesy on my part, although Tupra did not make me feel this to be the case, rather, perhaps, the opposite, for he was one of those rare individuals who can ask for a loan and manage to make the person giving the loan feel that he is the debtor.

'It didn't ring true to me at all that they were prepared to shoot the Lord High Parachutist, even if the success or failure of the operation depended on it. I did, therefore, believe him when he said that they wouldn't cause him any physical harm at all, if it turned out they couldn't get rid of him.'

'And what was the untrue context for this truth?'

'Well, as I say, I don't know why this gentleman came to see you, or what he wants to get out of you . . .'

'Oh, nothing from me, or from us, we have nothing to give,' broke in Tupra. 'They sent him to us merely so that we could pass judgement, that is, give our opinion on how convincing or truthful he is. That's why I'm interested to know your views, you speak the same language, or perhaps it isn't the same any more. I mean, I can't understand half the dialogue in some American films, they'll have to start adding subtitles soon when they show them over here, maybe it's the same with Latin American Spanish. There are subtleties of vocabulary, expressions I can't recognise or appreciate in translation. Other sorts of subtlety I can, precisely because I can't understand what someone is saying, and that sometimes proves very useful. Words distract sometimes, you see, and hearing only the melody, the music, is often fundamental. Now tell me what you think.'

Armed with boldness and indifference, I decided to improvise some more. I could hold out no longer, though, and finally lit a cigarette, not mine, however, but an expensive Rameses II, to which I asked his permission to help myself (he agreed of course, and didn't seem at all put out, although each cigarette must have cost around fifty pence).

'My impression is that there are no serious plans for a coup d'état. Or if there are, then this man will play no part in it or will have very little say in the matter. I assume you've checked his identity. If he's a soldier in exile or no longer in the army, or retired, an opponent with contacts in the country, but who acts from outside, then it's likely that his task is to raise funds based on nothing or based only on the vaguest of plans and on very tenuous information. And his own pockets may be the final destination for whatever money he does collect, after all, people tend not to ask questions or provide answers about money spent on abortive clandestine operations. If, on the other hand, he still is a soldier and has some authority, and is living in the country, and presents himself to us as someone regretfully betraying his leader for the good of the nation, then it's not impossible that the Comandante himself has sent him, to put out some feelers, to get in early, to make some enquiries, to be forewarned, and, if the opportunity arises, to raise funds from abroad that will doubtless end up in Chavez's own pockets, quite a clever move really. I also think that he might be neither one nor the other, that is, that he may not be and may never have been a military man. Anyway, I don't think he's behind anything serious, anything that would actually happen. As he himself said, the truth is what happens, which is a rough-and-ready way of saying just that. I would guess that this plan of his is never going to come to anything, with or without support, with or without financial help, internal, external or interplanetary.' I had got carried away by my own boldness, I stopped. I wondered if Tupra would say something now, even if only about the title under which the Venezuelan had presented himself to him (I had deliberately said 'presents himself to us', seeing that I was now included). 'If he doesn't,' I thought, 'he's obviously one of those people who is impossible to draw out, and who only says what he really means or what he knows he can safely reveal.' 'All this is pure speculation, of course,' I added. 'Impressions, intuitions. You did ask me for my impressions.'

Now he too lit his cigarette, his precious, saliva-sodden Rameses II. He probably couldn't stand to see me enjoying mine, or, rather, his, fifty pence going up in smoke in someone else's mouth, in, what's more, a continental mouth. He coughed a little after the first puff of that piquant Egyptian blend, perhaps he only smoked two or three a day and never quite got used to it.

'Yes, I realise you can't know anything for sure,' he said. 'Don't worry. I don't either, or not much more. But, tell me, why do you think that?'

I continued to improvise, or so I thought.

'Well, the man definitely looks the part of the Latin American military man, I'm afraid they're not much different from their Spanish counterparts twenty or twenty-five years ago, they all have moustaches and they never smile. His appearance just cried out for a uniform, a cap, and a superabundance of medals festooning his chest, as if they were cartridge belts. Yet there were some details that just didn't fit. They made me think that he wasn't a military man disguised as a civilian, as I at first thought, but a civilian disguised as a military man disguised as a civilian, if you see what I mean. They're really insignificant details,' I said apologetically. 'And it's not as if I've had many dealings with the military, I'm hardly an expert.' I broke off, my momentary boldness was fading.

'That doesn't matter. And I do see what you mean. Tell me, what details?'

'Well, they're really tiny things. He used, how can I put it, inappropriate language. Either soldiers nowadays aren't what they were and have been infected by the ridiculous pedantry of politicians and television presenters, or the man simply isn't a military man; or he was, but hasn't seen active service for a long time. And that gesture of tucking in his shirt was too spontaneous, like someone used to civilian clothes. I know it's silly, and soldiers do sometimes wear suit and tie, or a shirt if it's hot, and it is hot in Venezuela. I just felt that he wasn't a soldier, or else had been out of the army and hadn't worn an army jacket for some time, or had been removed from his post, I don't know. Or hadn't worn even a guayabera or a liki-liki or whatever they call them over there, they're always worn outside the trousers. And I felt, too, he was overly preoccupied with the crease in his trousers, and with creases in general, but then you get vain, dapper officers everywhere.'

'You can say that again,' said Tupra. 'Liki-liki,' he said, but didn't ask any more. 'Go on.'

'Well, perhaps you noticed his boots. Short boots. They may have looked black from a distance or in a bad light, but they were bottle-green in colour and looked like crocodile, or possibly alligator. I can't imagine any high-ranking officer wearing footwear like that, not even on his days of absolute leisure or total abandon. They seemed more suited to a drug-dealer or a ranch-hand on the loose in the big city or something.' I felt like a minor Sherlock or, rather, a fake Holmes. I leaned back my chair a little in the sudden hope of catching sight of Tupra's feet. I hadn't noticed what he was wearing, and it had suddenly occurred to me that he might be wearing similar boots and that I might be making a grave mistake. He was an Englishman: it was unlikely, but one never knows and he did have a strange surname. And he always wore a waistcoat, a bad sign that. As it turned out, I was unlucky, I couldn't get far enough back, the desk prevented me from seeing his feet. I went on — although if he was himself sporting some rather eccentric footwear, I was only making matters worse: 'Of course, in a country where the Commander-in-Chief appears in public dressed to look like the national flag and wearing a beret that's a shade of brothel red, as he did recently on television, it's not impossible that his generals and colonels do wear boots like that, or sabots or even ballet shoes, in these histrionic times and with a role model like him, anything's possible.'

'Sabots?' asked Tupra, perhaps more out of amusement than because he hadn't understood me. 'Sabots?' he said, since that was the term I had used: thanks to the translation classes I taught in Oxford and to my time spent toiling for various slave-drivers, I know the most absurd words in English.

'Yes, you know, those wooden shoes with pointed tips like onions. Nurses wear them and the Flemish, of course, at least they do in their paintings. I think geishas do as well, don't they, with socks?'

Tupra gave a short laugh, and so did I. Perhaps he had had a sudden image of the Venezuelan gentleman wearing clogs. Or perhaps Chavez himself, in thick-soled clogs and white socks. On a first meeting and at a party, Tupra struck one as a nice man. He did on a second meeting too and in his office, although there he let it be understood that he could never entirely forget the serious nature of his work, nor be entirely contained by it either.

'Did you say he dresses to look like the national flag? You presumably meant draped in the flag, did you?' he added.

'No,' I said. 'The print on his shirt or army jacket, I can't remember quite what he was wearing, was the flag itself, complete with stars.'

'Stars? I can't remember the Venezuelan flag at the moment. Stars?' To my relief, he did not appear to have taken my comments about the shoes personally.

'It's striped, I think. A red stripe and a yellow one, I seem to recall, and possibly a blue one too. And there's a sprinkling of stars on it somewhere. The President was definitely adorned with stars, of that I'm sure, and broad stripes, an army jacket or a shirt with horizontal stripes in those colours or similar. And stars. It was probably a
l
iki-liki,
which is a shirt they wear for special occasions, I think, well, they do in Colombia, I'm not sure about Venezuela.'

'Stars indeed,' he said. He gave another short laugh, and I did too. Laughter creates a kind of disinterested bond between men, and between women, and the bond it establishes between women and men can prove an even stronger, tighter link, a profounder, more complex, more dangerous and more lasting link, or one, at least, with more hope of enduring. Such lasting, disinterested bonds can become strained after a while, they can sometimes become ugly and difficult to bear, in the long term, someone has to be the debtor, that's the only way things can work, one person must always be slightly more indebted to the other, and commitment and abnegation and worthiness can provide a sure way of making off with the position of creditor. I've often laughed with Luisa like that, briefly and unexpectedly, both of us seeing the funny side of something quite independently, both us laughing briefly at the same time. With other women too, with my sister first of all; and with a few others. The quality of that laughter, its spontaneity (its simultaneity with mine perhaps) has led me, on occasions, to meet a woman and approach her or even to dismiss her at once, and with some women it's as if I've seen them in their entirety before even meeting them, without even talking, without them having looked at me and with me barely having looked at them. On the other hand, even a slight delay or the faintest suspicion of mimetism, of an indulgent response to my stimulus or my lead, the merest suggestion of a polite or sycophantic laugh — a laugh that is not entirely disinterested, but is egged on by the will, the laugh that does not laugh as much as it would like to or as much as it allows itself or yearns or even condescends to laugh — is enough for me promptly to remove myself from its presence or to relegate it immediately to second place, to that of mere accompaniment, or even, in times of weakness and a consequent slide in standards, to that of cortege. But the other kind of laughter — Luisa's, which almost anticipates our own laughter, my sister's, which wraps around us, young Pérez Nuix's, which fuses with our own and about which there is no hint of deliberation and in which we two are almost forgotten (although there is also detachment and arbitrariness and equality) — I have tended to give that a prime role which has subsequently turned out to be lasting or not, even dangerous at times, and, in the long run (when it has lasted that long), difficult to sustain without the appearance or intervention of some small debt, whether real or symbolic. However, the absence or diminution of that laughter is even harder to bear, and always brings with it the day when one of the two is obliged to get a little deeper into debt. Luisa had withdrawn her laughter from me some time ago, or else was rationing it out, I couldn't believe she had lost it entirely, she would still, surely, offer it to others, but when someone withdraws their laughter from us, that is a sign that there is nothing more to be done. It is a disarming laugh. It disarms women and, in a different way, men too. I have desired women - intensely - for their laughter alone, and they have usually seen that this was so. And sometimes I have known who someone was simply by hearing their laugh or by never hearing it, the brief, unexpected laugh, and even what would happen between that person and me, whether friendship or conflict or irritation or nothing, and I haven't been far wrong either, it might have taken some time to happen, but it always has, and, besides, there's always time as long as you don't die or as long as neither that other person nor I should die. That was Tupra's laugh and mine too, and so I had to ask myself for a moment whether, in the future, he or I would be disarmed, or if, perhaps, both of us would.
'
Liki-liki
,' he said again. It's impossible not to repeat such a word, irresistible. 'Yes, but it's true, is it not, that one cannot judge the customs of another place from outside?' he added drily or only half-seriously.